RE: Antler Resctrictions in PA
I just keep throwing the whole shotgun thing out there cause I can't believe that our large population of rifle hunters aren't going nuts threatening a revolution over this antler restriction idea. Here is my thinking...I'd have to guess that the average hunter in this state is a rifle hunter who probably hunts the first day, second day and the two Saturdays and maybe an occasional evening after work. That's about all the time he has. He is very lucky to see one flash of antler in a year and killing a buck of any size is a great year. Just about every buck he does kill is running full tilt across a mountain top or down a hollow, he's lucky to have enough time to see antlers and shoot. If now he has to only shoot a deer with four points on a side the odds of him killing a buck are slim to none. Even let's say in a couple of years we start seeing some larger racked bucks it is still very very unlikely that with a buck running full tilt a rifle hunter has the time to put the deer in his scope, be sure of the points and then shoot it. It's just not going to happen very often. I'd have to believe a lot of rifle hunters will go many years sometimes without killing a buck. And I can't think the average rifle hunter is really too concerned with quality deer management and killing bigger bucks, he's happy killing any buck. So, if I'm a rifle hunter right now and I know that one of PAs goals is to get some age on our bucks in general I'm thinking there are two realistic ways of doing this, antler restrictions or shotguns only and I'd be willing to buy a shotgun if I didn't have one and still be able kill any buck I see rather than use a rifle and only kill a buck with four points on it. that's just how I'd be thinking